The Dust is Bothering My Allergies
by recursivetomatoes
Summary: It's been four years since Thanos snapped his fingers. Some people are better off. Most are not. Luis has spent three years searching for Scott, but now he has a plan. He'll need the help of 14-year-old Cassie and her newfound friends, the Young Avengers, to save the world. Meanwhile, the remaining (old) Avengers have left Earth in search of Thanos. Can Luis beat them to the win?
1. Chapter 1

Author's Note: I felt inspired after watching Ant-Man so welcome to the story of the aftermath featuring Luis and Cassie, two comedic highlights from the most recent film.

With their world shaken, Luis and Cassie are no longer supporting players in Scott's tale. It's their time to lead the charge and save the world. Featuring an MCU interpretation of the Young Avengers.

This chapter is a short taste of what is to come.

Prologue

 **LUIS**

X-Con Security had been on a roll. But half the earth's population disappearing did them no favors. Dave, Kurt, and Scott had dropped off the face of the planet—perhaps literally—and Luis was left fielding dozens of calls from irate customers.

Luis rolled his eyes as the caller screamed at him: "What do you mean you're not liable? The goddamn CEO and half the employees upped and disintegrated! What do you mean your services aren't equipped for Avengers-level events? You promised us the best!"

Luis pressed the mute button on the phone and made faces while repeating the complainer's complaints in a mocking tone. It was lonely doing it without the guys there to laugh along, but it was all Luis could do to keep from going insane. Unless it would be considered to make jokes to yourself. If that was the case, he would amend his rationalization and say that he was doing it to pass the time.

The voice on the line finally stopped ranting, so Luis disengaged the mute button. "Hey man, I appreciate your criticism and all, but next time you wanna make complaints, and you know I'm always up for a phone call—it gets lonely in the office, ya hear—but yeah, next time read the fine print before you call."

Luis pushed himself up from his desk. Walking to the exit, he glanced at the empty desks. He could picture the guys goofing around and smiling, egging each other on.

He grinned for a moment before kicking the wall. He immediately regretted it because the wall barely got a scratch, but his big toe was throbbing, and it was his right toe, which was his preferred toe, although he also appreciated his left toe. In general, he considered toes to be an underrated body part. He never understood why torturers always went for the fingers first. If you break the toes first, you get two advantages—first, they're expecting you to go for the fingers, so you show them how underrated the toes are; second, it's a lot harder to escape with a bunch of broken toes. Luis had told that to a guy at prison once and had ended up with a broken toe, so now he was keeping that info to himself.

A life of crime was looking more and more enticing. His wasn't the only business threatening to go out of business since half the planet disappeared—even the world's governments were in danger of folding—but he'd just finished celebrating his first big business success. He trudged out of the room and wished there was some way to undo all of this bullshit.

* * *

 **CASSIE**

The moment the world changed, Cassie was playing Minecraft on her computer. Her mom and stepdad were glued to the TV downstairs and had shooed her up to her room. Something about a terrorist attack on the east coast or maybe in Europe or was it Africa? It all seemed so far away.

Cassie's world ended quietly. There was no warning, no screaming, no loud bangs. She got bored of Minecraft and scampered downstairs to grab a snack. From the front of the stairwell, she had a partial view of the living room. The TV was still on, but it didn't look like anyone was sitting on the couch. At ten years old, Cassie was proud to say that she was mature enough to be left alone during the day, but it was still unusual for both her mom and Jim to leave without saying anything first. And leaving the TV on was even stranger.

Something about the situation sent a shiver crawling across her body. She took a few steps toward the living room and peered in. Immediately, the dread washed away. She was wrong. She was not alone. Jim, for whatever reason, was not sitting on the couch but on the floor, in front of a pronounced pile of dust. After a moment of watching his unmoving ritual, she approached him until she was standing next to him, watching him watch the dust. Several minutes passed.

"Jim?" she said.

He whipped his head around, and normally Cassie would tease him for being a scaredy-cat, but something on that face—she had never seen him so fearful—made her freeze too. Jim's eyes widened for a moment before he shot to his feet and engulfed Cassie in a bear hug.

"Thank god," he whispered into her hair.

"Jim? Where's my mom?" She asked her voice muffled.

He shook his head. "I don't know. I don't know what happened. She just...disappeared."

Cassie had so many questions, but at that moment her mouth ceased to function. She wriggled out of her stepdad's grasp and stood in the center of the room, sucking in breath after breath, panting, hyperventilating. She was breathing so quickly, it felt almost as if she needed the next breath before she had even taken one.

"Breathe. Breathe." Jim rubbed her back. Her breaths returned to normal. He smiled but his eyes were tired. "It's ok. It's going to be ok." He spoke rhythmically.

Cassie looked up at him.

He placed his arms on her shoulders. "Your dad will know what to do."


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 1

Four Years Later...

ELIJAH

Half the earth's population had disappeared, and in the four years that had passed since then, the world had changed. With half of the world's leaders snapped away, civil wars had sprung all over the world. Countries plunged into chaos. Parents lost children. Children lost parents.

Elijah Bradley was an orphan. His mom had been there one second. Gone the next. Reduced to ash. Twelve years old when it happened, sixteen now, he tried his best to take care of his disabled grandfather, but money was tight and help was nowhere to be found. Everyone else had their own problem to worry about. The only silver lining was that his landlord had been snapped away, and no one had come by to collect the rent in months.

Eli's grip on the phone tightened. "He's going to die."

"Eli, you have to understand," Eli's uncle Josiah said through the phone, "it's bad out here. I'm sending all the money I can, but I'm barely holding myself together."

"I can't just let him die. If I don't take care of him no one will."

The line was silent for a moment. "Fine, he can come too. But I want you to come live with me. I can protect you. Your sisters miss you too."

Like his father Isaiah before him, Josiah was a superhero. Josiah and his father, Isaiah, Eli's grandfather had a strained relationship. Josiah didn't come from a natural birth—scientists tortured Isaiah and, to recreate his powers, extracted Isaiah's semen and artificially inseminated a Josiah's mother. When a teenaged Josiah finally found his father, Isaiah was reluctant to accept Josiah. Eli's mom, Sarah, was sympathetic toward him and integrated her brother into her family, introducing him to his nephews and nieces.

Eli wasn't sure what led to Isaiah's rejection of Uncle Josiah but had his suspicions. Isaiah had already had issues. The government had kidnapped Isaiah and other young African American men to experiment on them to recreate the Super Soldier serum. The mental deterioration that had now left Isaiah wheelchair-bound and catatonic traced back to those experiments, and had possibly already been affecting Isaiah psychologically.

In Eli's lowest moments, he would wonder why so many healthy people died in the snap while Isaiah lived to suffer even more.

After the snap, Eli's two remaining siblings moved in with Josiah, but Eli stayed behind to take care of Isaiah. He hated to admit it, but he felt relieved when his sisters left. Stephanie and Dalia reminded him too much of their other two now-disintegrated siblings.

Isaiah stared into nothingness as Eli shoved their belongings into suitcases. The suitcases packed, Eli wheeled Isaiah's wheelchair into the kitchen and began preparing spaghetti. The water was just about boiling when a flash of blinding light filled the room. He shielded his eyes with his arms, and then sprang into action, dashing in front of his grandfather. The light died down, and in its place stood what looked to Eli to be a slimmed down Iron Man with a slightly off color scheme.

"Iron...teen?" he guessed, although the idea seemed absurd.

"Iron Lad," the visitor corrected. "I am from the future, but I seem to have miscalculated my arrival. I was looking for the Avengers, but they are no more."

With superheroes in the family, Eli had a relatively high tolerance for strange occurrences, but even he had to admit that this was bizarre. He chose to ignore the future part for now and focus on the Avengers part.

"There are some heroes left. Iron Man," Eli began listing, thinking that an oddball named Iron Lad would obviously be looking for Iron Man. However, Iron Lad didn't not react to that, although it was difficult to tell with the full metal mask. Eli continued, "Captain America, Black Widow."

From what had been publicized, Eli knew that Captain Marvel had led a significant group of the heavy hitters into space on some mystery mission—Thor, War Machine, Hulk, and Nova were all off planet at the moment. But while the already reduced number of superheroes had gone down even more with that mission, there were still some heroes left, including several Avengers as well as Eli's Uncle Josiah.

"Yes," Iron Lad said, "but I need a team. That's why I need you, Josiah."

Eli froze in place, unsure whether Iron Lad was being racist or just severely mistaken.

* * *

CASSIE

Cassie Lang swung her legs off the side of the lab table. Bill Foster's lab reminded her of the Pyms' but smaller, but not in the microscopic sense.

"I'm telling you, Cassie, and I know you I tell you this every time, but I have a feeling this is going to be the time. You know, the time," Luis said.

He placed the action figure in the observation chamber as Dr. Foster readied the monitoring equipment. Dr. Foster adjusted the dials, and then pressed the button that would shrink the action figure even smaller than it already was. He pressed the button, and the action figure immediately imploded.

"Again," Dr. Foster said, sighing.

Luis place a new action figure in the chamber, and Dr. Foster adjusted the dials to the opposite direction. He pressed the button, and the action figure began expanding. It grew in size until it was as tall as Luis, and Dr. Foster pressed the button again, stopping the growth.

"Oh my god," Dr. Foster breathed out.

"We did it!" Luis shouted.

Cassie was unimpressed. "What good is it going to do to grow something if you can't shrink it back down to normal size after?"

Luis and Dr. Foster exchanged glances, and Cassie suddenly felt more out of the loop than ever.

"This is just a theory, but..." Dr. Foster started, before Luis cut him off.

"Keep this on the down low, but Doc here was thinking that some cosmic rays or something show that maybe your dad isn't snapped but is actually shrunk down to micro Ant-Man size. And I was saying, man I was thinking that the whole time. We did only find three piles of ashes by the van lab, after all."

The lab in question was currently parked next to the refrigerator in Dr. Foster's lab.

"I think that I can calibrate the device to target human DNA, so that we can bring him back from the Quantum Realm without needing to access the realm." Dr. Foster paused. "Basically, we don't need to be able to shrink anyone back down because we're only trying to restore someone to normal size from a microscopic state."

Cassie nodded thoughtfully. "But..."

Dr. Foster held up his hand. "Not to worry. I won't stop trying to perfect the shrinking technology. It's best to approach this problem from multiple angles."

"I'm also using my thieving skills to try to track down what happened to Pym and Hope's superpower suits. Were they wearing them? Can clothes be snapped? It seems like that can be snapped when they are wearing them, but what if they're not? And you just know he had extras."

"If only I could refine my Goliath technology. It allows the user to increase in size and decrease back to normal size, but I can't seem to get it past the roadblock of decreasing below normal size. I think it has something to do with natural mental blocks against size reduction resulting in microversal approaches to the Quantum Realm." Dr. Foster paced to the other side of the room and retrieved a retro-looking belt, which he then placed on the lab table next to Cassie. "Young lady, could you please refrain from sitting on any furniture not intended to be a seat?"

Groaning, Cassie slid off of the lab table and walked up next to Luis.

She waited until Dr. Foster moves back to the switch board and his back was facing away before whispering into Luis's ear. "You thinking what I'm thinking?" She inclined her head at the belt on the table.

Luis grinned. "Sounds like a heist."

It wasn't much of a heist. Cassie strolled over to the lab table, slid the Goliath belt into her backpack, and Dr. Foster didn't even notice.


	3. Chapter 3

**KATE**

At first glance, the Bishops seemed like a perfect high-society family. The magazines loved to focus on the single father who had raised two daughters into strong, successful women after he lost his wife to cancer, and Derek Bishop loved pretending to be perfect.

He could be a doting father, but all too often he was overbearing and judgmental. The daughters weren't exactly perfect themselves. The older daughter, Susan, worked for one of the top law firms in New York but, in reality, had cheated her way into—and through—law school. The younger daughter, Kate, was still in high school but was already seasoned in brainstorming excuses for getting out of high society gatherings. Today, she wasn't so successful, and the three Bishops found themselves at a party in one of New York's most exclusive hotels.

Susan stood in the crowd mingling with the fellow elite like a second skin. Meanwhile, Kate sincerely wanted to impale someone with her stiletto.

"Say that again, asshole," she said through gritted teeth, her foot already in the air, ready to retrieve the weapon. The asshole in question loomed over her, at least several inches taller than her and several inches broader too.

His face twisted into an ugly snarl, and for a second, she thought he was going to come at her, and for a second, she really wanted him to try, but then a tipsy couple giggled their way toward them and he plastered a fake smile on his face as they approached.

His breath smelled like stale alcohol as he hovered in front of her. She crossed her arms, daring him to try something. For a moment, he stood there with his fake smile on his face and venom in his eyes until he finally retreated. Brushing past Kate, he slunk away into the crowd of people. "Bitch."

He didn't even have the balls to say it to her face.

Kate lingered at the party for a few more minutes before she felt confident that no one would notice or care if she left. She wandered out back to stand by the catering trucks near the loading bay. The area behind the hotel was just isolated enough to give her space without making her feel in danger.

It was a cool night, and she didn't have her coat, but the brisk temperature felt freeing even as it raised goosebumps on her arms. After a minute, she reached in her purse a dug out a cigarette. She didn't smoke, but sometimes she pretended to because it rankled her father.

"Hey, do you need a light?"

She nearly jumped out of her skin, but if anyone asked, she would say that she was only acting surprised so that no one would be suspicious about how honed her senses were. In reality, she had no idea where the boy came from, but judging from his uniform, he could have been lurking in the back of the catering van.

She gave the boy a once over. He didn't seem like the lurking type. He was around her age, and his catering uniform seemed a bit too large for his slender build. He was about her height and had some acne scattered across face. She hadn't been looking for company, but his smile was earnest and she found herself beckoning him over to stand next to her.

"I don't really smoke," she said, wagging her unlit cigarette. "Just wanted an excuse to not be inside."

"How edgy," he said playfully.

She rolled her eyes.

"I don't smoke either," he said. "I don't even have a lighter. Good thing you didn't take me up on that."

"What's your name?"

"I'm...um..." he blushed. "Crap. It's...it'll come to me."

She raised an eyebrow. "Well, I'm Kate. Let me know when you remember your name."

"It's Jack. Jack."

"Sure, Jack," Kate said dryly.

He rubbed the back of his head. "Okay, so that's not my real name. The truth is that I'm actually a superhero in disguise as a caterer because I heard that supervillains might be targeting this party."

"Yeah, okay." She crossed her arms, leaning her head back until in rested against the wall and letting the cigarette dangle in her fingers. It was late, and she wasn't quite in the mood for such inane conversation. He didn't seem dangerous, but he was seriously getting on her nerves. She wasn't sure who this kid was or why he decided to mess with her.

He smiled, and then his features morphed. Long black hair sprouted from his head. Even his clothes changed. In front of her stood a perfect imitation of herself right down to the exact stiletto heels she was wearing.

At first, no words came. Then, she breathed out. "Holy shit."

Kate had seen shapeshifters on TV, but it was still downright freakish to see one in person, especially one taking her shape. It was unsettling.

She kept her features neutral as she gazed at her double. "You're planning to take down a group of supervillains on your own?"

"Yeah," her doppleganger said. He—or she—or it—even had Kate's voice. "Well, not alone alone. I have a partner. He's already inside."

"I want in."

He grinned. "Cool. What's your power?"

"My wit," she replied, rolling her eyes.

"Of course you don't have a power. Okay. Okay. You can still help out if you don't tell Bill...er...my partner that I blew my cover to you."

"You can count on me."

"Thank god you're not one of the supervillains." He paused. "Wait, you aren't one of the supervillains, are you?"

It was somehow even weirder to hear her voice coming out of someone else than seeing her exact duplicate.

At that moment, gunshots sounded from the building. That was not a good sign.

They jogged inside just in time to avoid being stampeded as people rushed toward the exits. As they entered the ballroom, the shapeshifter switched from Kate's double into a green hulk-like teen.

"You can call me Hulkling."

The supervillain was some guy dressed as a pineapple shooting shockwaves. He had a group of henchmen who were wearing solid black knit bodysuits and, in place of the traditional ski mask, yellow quilted face masks that matched the supervillain. Somehow, Kate was not surprised.

Hulkling's partner, Bill or whatever, turned out to be a magic kid who was shooting lightning back at the pineapple man. The magic kid raised his staff and unleashed a mighty lightning blast at the attackers. When the lightning cleared, the pineapple man's suit smoked a little, but he seemed otherwise unharmed. The henchmen, on the other hand, were out for the count.

"His suit's insulated," Kate called. "Try something else."

She clenched her stiletto tightly in one hand and dove to dodge a stray lightning bolt heading her way. Bill really needed to work on his aim.

The pineapple man surged forward, grabbing the mage by the scarf. Kate liked the splash of color from the magic kid's scarf, but while that kind of design element looked cool, having something so grabbable could always backfire. He squirmed, gasping for breath as he struggled to get out of the villain's grip.

"Give up now, and I'll let the kid live," the man said. Speaking of unfortunate design elements, his quilted costume included a quilted mask that muffled his words and made him sound ridiculous.

Hulkling's face twisted in anger and concern, and if Hulkling was anything like his namesake, pineapple would not like what was coming.

"Hey, bad guy," Hulkling cried out. Said bad guy whipped his head around but tightened his grip on the mage. Hulking turned a paler shade of green. "Um. Hulkling smash?" he said, his voice rising in pitch.

He raised his arms, ready to strike, when Kate saw an opening. She put her head down and dashed forward. In a swift motion, she embedded her stiletto heel straight into pineapple's hand.

He dropped the mage and cradled the wound. "Owwwwww."

Before he could retaliate, Kate swiped her leg in roundhouse kick and knocked the villain to the ground. He hit the ground hard, and Hulkling gave him one last knock on the head for good measure.

Kate pumped a hand in the air. "Take that, Pineapple Man."

"That's the Shocker," the mage said, his voice raspy. He coughed and Hulkling rushed over, taking his hand. "I'm okay. I'll be okay," the mage said. He turned to Kate. "So, that was completely badass, Miss..."

"Kate. Kate Bishop."

"Thanks, Kate. I'm Wiccan."

"I'm Teddy," Hulkling said, giving a small wave.

"Hulkling, we just met her," Wiccan said, using his staff as a crutch to help himself to his feet.

Hulkling shrugged, lifting Wiccan the rest of the way. "She saved your life."

Kate felt the adrenaline begin to recede from her body. "Don't worry. You can trust me, Bill."

"Teddy..." Wiccan twisted out of Hulking's arm to raise an eyebrow at him.

"Billy," Hulking responded.

"I thought we agreed on having secret identities!" Billy said, burying his face in his hands.

"In fairness, you don't even wear a mask," Kate pointed out.

"That's because I cast a spell to conceal my identity when I'm Wiccan."

"Really?" Kate and Teddy both asked.

"No. But I would do that if I wasn't such a shit-tier witch."

"You're not a shitty witch," Teddy said.

"Thanks."

"But if you are," Teddy said, engulfing Billy in a bear hug, "then you're my shitty witch."

After the police came to take the criminals away, a portal opened right where Kate was standing. Luckily, it didn't slice her in half. Instead, two figures stepped through the portal—a smaller, sleeker Iron Man wannabe and a teenage Captain America knockoff.

"Iron Lad, Patriot! You made it!" Teddy grinned, spreading his arms in greeting.

"They didn't make it! They're late. Like super late. Like how-can-someone-with-a-time-machine-be-this-late levels of late," Billy said.

Teddy rubbed the back of his head. "You were the one who warned us this attack was going to happen," he said to Iron Lad.

"We missed it? What is that 21st century expression—my bad?" Iron Lad said. "I'd say that I could take us back in time a half hour and help you defeat the Shocker, but it seems that you were successful without us."

"He's from the 30th century," Teddy whispered to Kate, which explained...something.

Finally he seemed to notice Kate's presence. "And who are you?"

Teddy clasped a hand to her back. "This is our new recruit, Stiletto Girl."

Kate glanced at the now-discarded stiletto across the room. It was covered in blood, and she was never wearing that particular shoe again. "No, that is not going to be my code name," she said, rolling her eyes, "but I'm game to join your group. Someone needs to pick up the slack for the Avengers after the snap."

"My historical records have no matches for you," Iron Lad said, tilting his head. "What are your powers?"

Kate picks up her other, not-yet-weaponized stiletto. "Next person to ask that gets a stiletto through the brain."


End file.
